


the watcher's call

by stellarmads



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Do Not Archive (The Magnus Archives), Dreamsharing, Eye Trauma, M/M, Mild Gore, Paranoia, The Magnus Archives Season 2, This Is Not Going To Go The Way You Think, self destructive urges
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-09
Updated: 2020-09-09
Packaged: 2021-03-07 01:15:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 550
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26368558
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stellarmads/pseuds/stellarmads
Summary: Jon wishes the man with no eyes would stop haunting him.  Alternatively, this week on I am shamelessly head over heels for Elias.
Relationships: Elias Bouchard/Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist
Comments: 4
Kudos: 52
Collections: The Magnus Archives Fanfiction





	the watcher's call

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first TMA work, so I thought I should be clear. Elias is a terrible man and given the chance I would absolutely deck him. But don't you love to hate him? Also I wanted a more in depth study of how much Jon is drawn to the Beholding, and what guilt may lie there. I may expand on this, but knowing my track record...>doubt

Jon wishes the man with no eyes would stop haunting him. In the drifting moments between conscious pondering and abstract thought, he feels the cold prickle on the back of his neck. A quiet sensation, so gentle that perhaps a less observant person would be able to ignore it entirely. But Jon has spent months alone with ink, paper, and that mechanical whir of a quiet lullaby. It’s like catching a whiff of a childhood scent, so faded in memory that it is but reflex. 

He knows what beckons him, what awaits. And so when that loving crackle croons out to him, his shaky hands are pouring another cup of cold coffee, quickly and desperately downing the contents. He prefers tea, he thinks, after every freezing, stale, bitter gulp. The near empty pack of smokes stare up at him, accusingly, from underneath his desk lamp. 

The human body can only take so much before it betrays the mind. Only so many gentle pink dawns one can greet before the dark consumes conscious thought. Despite his expanded efforts, Jon is but a man. A stubborn man, resolute, jaw set as he clenches the edge of the desk, the gripping pain drifting in and out in sharp waves. When The Archivist’s shoulders finally slump, when his eyes drift closed, tension draining from his clenched jaw, his last waking thought is faint recognition, dread, and anticipation as that prickle envelops his entire being. 

The man waits for him there, in the inky depths of subconscious panic and paranoia. Jon does not greet him, does not make a move. But for once, this is as much his dream as it is his visitor’s. The man smiles widely, and Jon’s eyes are unwillingly dragged up to his profile. Two gaping holes stare back at him, and despite nothing but flesh to register what is front of him, Jon feels Seen. 

The man’s greeting is the same. He raises both arms, hands outstretched, palms upturned, and although Jon knows what is there, he cannot stop his gaze from travelling down. The eyes that stare up at him, one in each hand, are dark and shining with light. The pupils widen as they focus on Jon, and Jon feels them expanding, pulling him in, that sweet, crackling lullaby sweeter than ever. 

There’s a shift of expression on that calm, decisive face that haunts him. A knowing twist of the mouth, that familiar smile...Familiar where? It’s intoxicating, and for one moment Jon finds himself leaning forward, before the known stranger’s offer stops him, as sudden and as sure as it does every restless night. 

“We can share them, if you’d like.” 

The eyes stare, stare and watch, stare and witness, stare and understand. Jon wishes nothing more than to say he doesn’t want this, that he doesn’t understand. But some stirring part of him, buried deep within his nature, reaches out. The man smiles widely again, knowing, and pushes his gifts closer. 

The ache to finally be filled, to know satiation, to Understand...This is what wakes Jon, ripping him away from his seduction. And although Jon knows the stranger, when the dream fades with the early morning sunlight, when Elias tosses another dusty statement onto his desk, Jon forgets what was familiar about him at all.


End file.
